Behind The Story   

Elsewhere on our Web site you can see the news that United Business Media will reprise Comdex in the form of a virtual event in November. The live version breathed its ignominious last breath six years ago, and still tradeshow industry veterans are sharing their tales (some of them, tall tales) about its rise and fall.

Occasionally, when I speak with somebody who knows almost nothing about the tradeshow industry, the one show they tend to be able to call to mind is Comdex. It’s the show, dead or alive, everybody’s heard of. (Of course, a new generation of non-TSW readers is beginning to say, “Oh, you mean like ...Read More

A while back, I mentioned to a show organizer I know in Hong Kong that I’d been to Macau a couple months earlier and visited the convention and tradeshow facilities at the Venetian Macau.

His response was, “Could you see it for all the cobwebs?”

Although it’s not possible to get anybody at the Las Vegas Sands to comment on much of anything, from the ground level it looks like – though there have been some successful shows held there – the dream that, along with so many other things, M...Read More

People in Washington, D.C., have been telling me an anchor hotel next to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center was on its way practically since I first came to Tradeshow Week more than seven years ago.

The all-too-clichéd “ducks in a row” seemed to be lined up, however, with the land secured, investors in place, a brand (Marriott) decided on and a date for groundbreaking established. Then, a couple of weeks ago, the owners of another Marriott down the street, the Wardman Park ...Read More

The recent announcements that Greg Farrar had resigned as president and CEO of Nielsen Business Media and that Gordon T. Hughes II would be leaving American Business Media later this summer can be added to a long list of similar announcements concerning tradeshow-related institutions during the past year or so.

In fact, there have been so many of these announcements, under so many different kinds of circumstances, that one of the first – Mike Cooke, former CEO of dmg world media – now practically seems like ancient history.

It inspired me to get at least semi-scientific about...Read More

Intl. CES opened today. Even in good years, the giant consumer products show is invested with great significance. It’s both the first major show of the year and typically the largest. (For many years now, it’s been No. 1 on the Tradeshow Week 200 whenever CONEXPO-CON/AGG doesn’t bump it down to No. 2.)

Whether they should or not, many in the tradeshow world figure the story on Intl. CES will tell them something about how their shows might do later in the year. Last year’s Intl. CES showfloor amounted to just more than 1.7 million square feet, about 150,000 sq. ft. smaller than the 2...Read More

Luckily, once in a while I know to keep my mouth shut. During IAEE’s Expo! Expo! in Atlanta, a reporter for the Atlanta Constitution asked me what kind of “qualities” would be necessary for the person selected to replace Dan Graveline as executive director of the Georgia World Congress Center.

The question was so vague and meaningless, I asked him to be a little more specific. He explained enough for me to realize I would only have revealed I didn&rsquo...Read More

At the beginning of the second day (second for me, at least) of IAEE’s Expo! Expo! and having shaken a couple of hundred hands, I think it’s safe to make the assessment that things are much better this year than last.

The standard answer to the standard question, “How are things going?” was, “This year has been miserable, but I’m optimistic about next year.”

Like many people and many companies in other parts of the economy, the certainty that the sun will come up tomorrow is a good sign. A ye...Read More

The recent news that two Tradeshow Week 200 shows would forsake Chicago in 2012 for other destinations has, for the most part, been characterized as a sad story for the city itself – and it is. However, just as significant is the quick one-two punch delivered by exhibitors to the entire tradeshow industry.

Although I’m reluctant to call this an unprecedented move, the urgency with which the Healthcare Information Management and Systems Society and the Society of the Plastics Industry dealt with this and the lengths they went to in order to accommodate their exhibitors must be testament to the degree of dissatisfaction expressed during their shows held ear...Read More

Viad Corp. held its third-quarter conference call this morning, and it couldn’t have been an easy call for GES Chairman, President and CEO Paul Dykstra to make.

He had to say things like “We continue to manage costs downward to mitigate revenue declines,” and “Clearly the fourth quarter will be difficult.”

Net loss in the third quarter was $97.1 million. Revenue was $181.1 million, more than $120 million less than during the same period last year. Revenue at GES was cut nearly in half comp...Read More

As I try to crystallize my thoughts here, euphemisms keep popping into my head. When I “read the tea leaves,” do I see “light at the end of the tunnel” or am I “putting lipstick on a pig?”

Here at Tradeshow Week, we are just entering what is always the busiest couple of months for us. This week we are getting ready for the issue that includes our first-ever Green Innovation Awards. At the same time, we’re making all kinds of preparations for our TSW Fastest 50 event Nov. 13-15 – and we’re looking ahead to the mega-issue we always put out to coincide with Expo! Expo! IAEE’s Annual Meeting & Exhi...Read More

There were two major breaking news items yesterday for the tradeshow industry: First thing in the morning was the news that Canon Communications had acquired three plastics shows in Toronto and planned to build another of its MD&M juggernauts around them. Then, in the afternoon, came the news that Questex Media sought Chapter 11 protection in bankruptcy court.

I suspect before the week is done we’ll have more information on both stories and there will be longer pieces in an upcoming issue of Tradeshow Week. In prerecession days, we probably would have applied a little journalistic shorthand and said here’s an example of a company that’s doing th...Read More

We have been on a campaign here at Tradeshow Week for at least a couple of years. We’ve been trying to point out the efforts being made in the industry that trend toward environmental sustainability.

Certainly, there’s been plenty of green newsprint associated with all this and, perhaps like you, my eyes glaze over sometimes at references to LEED certification, the latest eco-friendly exhibit booth and recycled carpet.

Still, as in every other part of the economy, it is one tiny step at a time that will take the tradeshow industry a little further away from the sometimes und...Read More